Circle trilogy only great if you care about what happens to Bajor?

[Navaros]

I've seen the Circle trilogy often get high praise on this board. I just re-watched it for the first time in years to see what all the fuss is about.

Although I can appreciate that it is an interesting situation from a dramatic perspective, I do not find it entertaining because I couldn't care less if Bajor's provisional government falls and all the Bajorans massacre each other in a civil war or if Cardassia comes back and enslaves and/or nukes Bajor. In fact, I'd prefer that because then I wouldn't have to hear Bajorans whining about the occupation for the 100 billionth time in subsequent episodes. The Circle trilogy IMO would have been much better/more entertaining if somehow they had instead structured the same kind of situation around something that I cared about, instead of the fate of Bajor.

I also must give it respect for having very spot-on writing about how terrorists operate in unstable societies; the writers really did their research and knew all this stuff before it was in the news every day like in the 2000's. But, although I appreciate their knowledge and making the terrorism true-to-life, it still didn't help it be entertaining to me.

I felt the scenes of Fletcher and Langella together were totally wasted...here you have two of the very best actors in the world, and the dialogues they have together isn't anywhere close to being worthy of their prowess. That hugely disappointed me. They didn't use Langella very well overall, either. I wonder if he would have accepted being credited if they had written Jaro as well as they wrote Winn throughout the series as a whole? It also invoked bad memories of BajoranDukat and Winn, which in hindsight, it looks like for that they just re-packaged the Winn/Jaro thing and added some more silliness to it.

I loved how Langella had enough gravitas as an actor to hold his own in a meeting vs. the Sisko, but I felt they could have elevated that potential a lot more than they did by giving it better dialogue. But again, maybe I'd feel differently about that if I cared about Bajor, which I don't.

For those of you who give the Circle trilogy high praise: is that because you have an emotional attachment to what happens to Bajor? Otherwise, what are the reasons you give it high praise for?

 

[Pemmer Harge]

Well to enjoy The Siege you only have to care about what happens to DS9. Indeed, what happens on Bajor in the trilogy as a whole threatens the main characters, since if Jaro gets his way they'll presumably have to leave. I am quite interested in Bajor, I'll admit, but the trilogy had some nice action and good guest stars and it was probably the most ambitious thing DS9 had done up to that point, so it gets a thumbs up from me.

 

[Too Much Fun]

THANK YOU! I thought I was the only one who had anything negative to say about these episodes. My first time watching DS9 all the way through, I watched it on TV and missed the weeks when these episodes were broadcast. While I was on season 6, I kept hearing on this board about how great the Circle Trilogy was, so I went back and checked it out.

The result was that like so many early season episodes that focus on Bajor, Kira, Winn, and various Vedeks, it bored me out of my mind and was a real chore to get through. I have a biased towards episodes that focus on characters and their issues rather than plot developments, so all this plotting for political power stuff gets on my nerves really fast.

And I agree that it's really disappointing how they used Frank Langella. Here's an Oscar nominee (not at the time, but still), and they couldn't find him anything interesting to say or do, even though DS9 generally has a really good track record with guest stars.

 

[Navaros]

Well to enjoy The Siege you only have to care about what happens to DS9. Indeed, what happens on Bajor in the trilogy as a whole threatens the main characters, since if Jaro gets his way they'll presumably have to leave. I am quite interested in Bajor, I'll admit, but the trilogy had some nice action and good guest stars and it was probably the most ambitious thing DS9 had done up to that point, so it gets a thumbs up from me.

Yes it does indeed affect what happens to DS9, but instead of what we got, I would have preferred for example, to see the DS9 crew kicked off the station and then coming back with a SF fleet to take it back from the Cardies after the Bajorans realized what fools they were and then begged the Feds to come back. IMO That would have been way better than the DS9 crew hiding in some shafts whilst talking-head Bajorans search for them, and everything else they did to wrap up the Circle trilogy.

I agree that it's a good point to respect it for its ambition. Other Trek shows would generally not have the balls to do something like this other than maybe once or twice in the whole series, max. DS9 beat their record for ambition starting with the Circle episodes.

THANK YOU! I thought I was the only one who had anything negative to say about these episodes. My first time watching DS9 all the way through, I watched it on TV and missed the weeks when these episodes were broadcast. While I was on season 6, I kept hearing on this board about how great the Circle Trilogy was, so I went back and checked it out.

The result was that like so many early season episodes that focus on Bajor, Kira, Winn, and various Vedeks, it bored me out of my mind and was a real chore to get through. I have a biased towards episodes that focus on characters and their issues rather than plot developments, so all this plotting for political power stuff gets on my nerves really fast.

And I agree that it's really disappointing how they used Frank Langella. Here's an Oscar nominee (not at the time, but still), and they couldn't find him anything interesting to say or do, even though DS9 generally has a really good track record with guest stars.

I like plot episodes when I actually care about the plot and it's a SciFi plot, like in Captive Pursuit which I consider to be DS9's finest SciFi plot. But I agree that the plot in the Circle trilogy isn't very interesting, IMO largely because it's not a SciFi plot. They could have put a plot like the Circle's in any non-SciFi show and it would have worked in the very same way; genericism like that is always a sign of bad writing.

I like character episodes when I actually care about the characters. But in Bajor's case, I don't care about the plot or characters (other than Winn, who I uniformly love in every episode due to the masterful performance by Fletcher combined with extremely clever writing, for the most part). The Vedek stuff bored me to tears in the Circle episodes. I still have no idea what the point of showing Kira naked and getting it on with Bareil was supposed to be; was that supposed DS9's version of ENT's rub & tug-esque decontamination scenes? Nor do I know what the point is of wasting tons of screen-time having Kira do nothing on Bajor.

I've always maintained and still do, that Bareil is horribly-acted. He is one of the most wooden and monotone actors I've ever seen. To me his performance makes him look like he thinks he is playing a mannequin. In re-watching the episodes yesterday it crossed my mind that maybe he is a changeling, because when the other actors (Siddig for example) play changelings, they adopt some of the Bareil actor's mannequin-style of acting. But there is nothing in the script itself to justify this Bareil-changeling theory hence I must revert back to my original opinion that he's just an awful actor. It boggles my mind that he was popular on the show and many fans enjoy him and wanted him to live. I literally struggle to stay awake with every second he is on-screen. Shakaar is actually charming and interesting, a major improvement over Bareil. Bareil was dead weight from day 1.

 

[TheGodBen]

I always enjoy political episodes like this regardless of which planet it takes place on, that's why I enjoyed these episodes. I also love them for helping to build up the previously established universe rather than just adding new aliens and anomalies for this sort of exploration which is what happened a lot in the first season. Bajor was an established world of strategic importance to the AQ, I found the fact that it was "in play" interesting regardless of how I felt about the people living there.

 

[Plomeek Broth]

On my current 2nd trip thru DS9, I find the Bajoran stories more interesting than before when I preferred cleaning out my sock drawer. I like the political stuff, but I do think Variel has horribly acted, a living, breathing snoozefest and the Bajorans do whine every other word about the occupation. But the Circle Trilogy is the first real sign of ambition in the series and I feel like they were doing something no Trek series had done before, giving DS9 a more epic feel. I wish the military leader of Bajor (the general on DS9 during The Siege) would have suckerpunched the dude from Wings. Per usual, Langella and Fletcher were great. Why was Kira attracted to someone with zero personality? In all seriousness, DS9 rocks and I will be watching Invasive Procedures tonight.

 

[Nerys Ghemor]

I personally thought "The Circle" was unbelievably prescient. When I was younger, I liked it but didn't really "get it."

When I did a re-watch in 2005, my jaw just about hit the ground. They NAILED--and I mean NAILED--the Iraq War, regardless of what you actually think about the war.

Just replace "Starfleet" with US, Bajoran factions with "Sunni," "Shi'a," and "Kurd," and Cardassian with "Iranian," and you've got it!

 

[Captrek]

First of all, as others have pointed out, it wasn’t just Bajor at stake. It was also the wormhole. As for Navaros’s suggestion that the Federation evacuate, allow Cardassia to retake the planet and the station, reentrench, establish strong defenses to protect the incredibly valuable resource of the wormhole, and then go to war with Cardassia to get rid of them and violate the Federation’s policy of not interfering in interior Cardassian matters (Bajor not being a member of the Federation)... Well, that’s just a horrible idea.

As for the Bajorans, I do care about them more than some other people posting in this thread. They just got through half a century of brutal occupation by the Cardassians. Throughout the occupation, other races, including the Federation, stood by and did absolutely nothing to help Bajor; instead they did business with the Cardassians, in effect encouraging and supporting the occupation, and generally did what what best for them without regard to the plight of the Bajorans. When Bajorans taught their children, “You can’t count on anybody but other Bajorans,” it was because it was true. Their xenophobia may be “bad” in the sense that it doesn’t fully align with our own values, but it is completely understandable. It doesn’t make me think “what a bunch of xenophobic assholes,” it just makes me feel sorry for what happened to them to make them that way.

 

[Nerys Ghemor]

Absolutely...the fact that the Federation only helped when it was politically expedient to do so--even one of the Cardassians (though mind you, a rebel and a dissident) in my fanfic finds that contemptible.

 

[Smiley]

After an entire season, if you're not caring about the Bajorans or even Kira at all, then the show is not working for you on some level.

 

[Too Much Fun]

Yes, but that doesn't mean the show could not be enjoyed. As I said in other threads, one of the best and worst things about DS9 is that there are so many character arcs and plot threads that sometimes I'm just torn because I love some and hate others as they're taking place simultaneously.

There were a lot of other characters and things going on in the show along with the Bajoran stuff and thank goodness for that, because if there wasn't, I would have given up on the show early on. I think the only thing I really liked about 'The Circle Trilogy' was the Federation bluffing giving up the station while some of its members stayed on board secretly.

Those scenes of them hiding while the Bajorans took over and then revealing themselves had some impressive tension, but the same sort of thing happened more effectively when the Dominion took over a few seasons later. I think of what happened in The Circle Trilogy as more of a rehearsal or 'dry run' for that...a more primitive and less exciting (though not without its own merits) version of the much greater and more epic takeover that was still to come.

 

[startrekwatcher]

I'm one of those who consider the Circle trilogy one of the great epic storylines DS9 put out over its seven year run.

There are a wide variety of reasons why I feel this way. For starters, I was happy to see that the story was going to span three weeks. It gave the kind of canvas I so often lamented was lacking with TNG's two-parters. It really afforded a nice pace to really explore the changes they introduced.

I also liked the foreboding that surrounded these episodes. "The Homecoming" nicely reveals that the unrest hinted at towards the end of season one has far from subsided. No far from it--it has gotten worse with the formation of a radical group that seeks to drive away all non-Bajorans. Then it beautifully reveals in "The Circle" that as much as Starfleet would like to think the group is comprised of thugs its members include seemingly respectable members of Bajoran society.

Another thing going in the trilogy's favor was how it pulled several threads together like bringing in Dukat and the Cardassians, Winn, Keiko's dissatifaction with Miles' post to DS9. The visions were beautifully done and it was fun trying to decypher their meanings.

It was interesting seeing Kira being useless or seeing Quark keeping Odo off-kilter or the tour de force group performance in Kira's quarters as everyone comes in to say their good-byes or Dax/Kira working together to get an old Bajoran raider working again or Odo deputizing Quark or Jake/Nog pondering whether they would see each other again or Rom screwing over Quark again by selling his seat or the chief discusing rations in cramped crawlspaces. A lot of what works in these three episodes are these little character moments like that which weren't so much directly tied into the central crisis but were interesting isolated scenes that added some texture. Or the feel good moments that make you want to stand up and cheer i.e. Kira walking into the council chambers with the evidence indicating Cardassian involvement or seeing the Starfleet officers voluntarily staying behind to help their Bajoran friends.

Also it had some really exciting action sequences--the escape from Cardassian IV, or the booby trapping of the station after the siege. Sisko had some wonderful dialog--his scene with Li Nalas about what Bajor needs or telling Jaro that he could see through his BS or thinking Jake came to him for some dating advice or his series of scenes with Kira or his speech in "The Siege" before evacuating paralleling nicely with the one he gave in "Call to Arms". This trifecta also was nicely reflective on how far Bajoran/Federation relations had come but yet how further they still had to go.

I also liked the writers did shake things up like when Kira was reassigned. And I look fondly on these trio of episodes because it was nice to see some world-building something that I think inspired Coto in season four with the Vulcan trilogies and the Andorian arc.

 

[Navaros]

As for Navaros’s suggestion that the Federation evacuate, allow Cardassia to retake the planet and the station, reentrench, establish strong defenses to protect the incredibly valuable resource of the wormhole, and then go to war with Cardassia to get rid of them and violate the Federation’s policy of not interfering in interior Cardassian matters (Bajor not being a member of the Federation)... Well, that’s just a horrible idea.

I don't think the Cardies would have had anywhere near enough time to do all that. The brunt of SF forces couldn't be that far away. They could get there fast enough to take back the station/wormhole/planet quickly and easily.

I also don't agree that it would be interferring in interior Cardassian matters. The Cardies would be the ones interferring with SF, not the other way around.

After an entire season, if you're not caring about the Bajorans or even Kira at all, then the show is not working for you on some level.

Yup, DS9's Bajoran angle has never worked for me. Nor for a lot of fans, which is one of the reasons why, thank God, they for the most part abandoned Bajoran stories in the later seasons; and when they did use them in later seasons, they rightly put the focus on the only thing that adds some entertainment value to them (unlike in Season 1, except for the finale): Louise Fletcher. I don't watch DS9 because I find it entertaining to listen to Bajorans whine ad nauseaum about being oppressed; I watch DS9 for its truly entertaining and interesting aspects instead, like Quark, Odo, Garak, Weyoun, Dukat, Winn (granted she's a Bajoran, but by far the most fascinating one, and I don't recall her whining about being oppressed) the Dominion etc. etc.

 

[Too Much Fun]

I don't watch DS9 because I find it entertaining to listen to Bajorans whine ad nauseaum about being oppressed; I watch DS9 for its truly entertaining and interesting aspects instead, like Quark, Odo, Garak, Weyoun, Dukat, Winn (granted she's a Bajoran, but by far the most fascinating one, and I don't recall her whining about being oppressed) the Dominion etc. etc.

I feel the same way, although I'm probably not as big a fan of Odo, Garak, or Winn as you. You've got at least one person in this thread who's pretty much in total agreement with you. Oh, and I forgot to mention when I was begrudgingly giving some credit to the Circle Trilogy for the very short list of things I did like in it - the scene where Kira is packing and people keep coming to see her was great fun. Definitely the highlight for me.

 

[Greylock Crescent]

The Circle Trilogy certainly is worthy of some criticism. There are diminishing returns from each episode -- the arc starts strongly and is unable to build toward a finale, rather it seems to devolve toward its end. The overall pacing is a bit awkward because of just how many plot threads it contains, some of the characters fall flat in their presentation ...

... on the other hand ...

The Circle trilogy is a wonderfully layered tale. And you don't have to care for the Bajorans so much as be able to empathize with any population that has suffered occupation, oppression and repression. It's allegory. As such, the socio-political commentary and exploration is exceptionally well-done. There's some solid character work.

And, I suspect, one of the biggest reasons why the trilogy gets such high praise is because it quite clearly and profoundly demonstrates the depth the series was willing to go to explore serious issues in very adult, multi-faceted ways. The connection back to the Season 1 finale is also important. For the first time really, this is an example of Star Trek creating a serialized story across four consecutive episodes (five if you want to count "Duet" which fits thematically) -- one that is also worthy of serious discussion and debate.

So despite its flaws (and it does have its flaws), and despite the personal tastes of viewers, the Circle Trilogy is a landmark "event" in Star Trek -- one that ought not be missed, and one that fans quite rightly tout as something special.

 

[flemm]

To enjoy the Circle Trilogy you do not have to care about the Bajorans per se. You just have to find the overall political situation that is being depicted in these episodes interesting. That is probably easier now, given that occupation, insurgency and counter-insurgency are all over the news.

None of the major Star Trek races are all that interesting in themselves, Bajorans included. They are all just humanity caricatured to emphasize some particular trait, for example the Klingons are warlike (as humans can be), the Romulans are devious (as humans can be). The Bajorans are religious (as humans often are), so they are there to explore that side of humanity.

The reason many did not find the occupation of Bajor interesting at the time, I would argue, is that the issues involved didn't seem as important or urgent back then. Also, these stories didn't involve some overtly sci-fi related gimmick, which is what people expected from Trek at the time. Actually, relying less on anomaly or alien of the week gimmicks is one of the strengths of DS9 throughout its run, even when Bajor is less of a focus later on. It just took a while for this strength to be recognized for what it was.

Regardless, the prescient quality of these episodes (and many other DS9 eps) is one of the things that makes the show hold up so well over time and often seem eerily contemporary to our world.

Basically, DS9 went ahead and explored some interesting ideas, even at the risk of alienating some viewers, which makes it a better show than if it had avoided those ideas because there was no popular desire for the show to explore them.

 

[JohanKoch]

Yup, DS9's Bajoran angle has never worked for me. Nor for a lot of fans, which is one of the reasons why, thank God, they for the most part abandoned Bajoran stories in the later seasons;

(stuff cut, bold mine)

That's a rather broad statement. It's true they abandoned that story arc, but I got the impression lot's of fans really did enjoy the Bajoran stories, and one of the complaints of the later seasons is the Bajoran politics got completely sidelined (in favour of Bajoran mysticism). Or at least I feel that way...

 

[DevilEyes]

Well, I cared about Bajor, because I was very interested in their story of occupation, oppression, resistance, and recent liberation and problems they had with dealing with the past and trying to rebuild their society. I especially found all Bajoran/Cardassian interactions compelling, with their complicated history. I guess it all struck a cord with me for many reasons. Both societies were also interesting in their own right - Cardassians with their oppressive militaristic culture, secret police and dissidents and Bajorans with their tensions between the religious and the secular. When I first watched DS9 (several years later - in the early 2000s, when it first aired in my country), "In the Hands of the Prophets" especially happened to mirror some events in mu country, with the Church trying to get more political and social influence and to force more conservative changes. I couldn't look at Kai Winn in that episode without thinking of the Minister of Education we had at the time, a woman of very conservative ideas, who tried to introduce Creationism to schools instead of the theory of Evolution (fortunately, it proved to be so much, and the government was forced to replace her). The stories about war crimes and dealing with the past (like "Duet") had even more similarities with issues that we were facing (and still do). As does the entire issue of rebuilding a society after a long period of wars and crises, and healing the relations between countries and groups of people who were involved in it.

Why was Kira attracted to someone with zero personality?
.

Eh, I didn't think he had "zero personality". He wasn't the energetic, funny, or powerfully charismatic type - and I can understand why you'd expect Kira's love interest to be more colourful, but I thought that their relationship made perfect sense. Bareil was a spiritual, intelligent, quiet, gentle, dignified, respected Bajoran religious leader. Kira is very religious, and Bareil was the kind of man she could admire, and he could also understand her. (And it didn't hurt that he was also very handsome.) So perhaps they didn't have the sizzling sexual chemistry that lights up the screen - then again, I can't really think of any man in DS9 she did have that kind of chemistry with (except maybe one who is totally in the realm of "hell no, never gonna happen"), but they did have chemistry, or in other words, to me they looked convincingly as a couple. It also worked better than Shakaar (even though Shakaar seems like the most obvious choice for Kira since they had so much in common), for the simple reason that we got to see more of Kira and Bareil together, and as a genuine storyline for Kira, rather than a plot device to get Odo to suffer. Kira's relationship with Shakaar was almost completely presented from Odo's point of view. But Odo's love for Kira was just barely hinted at while Bareil was alive, so that wasn't an issue.

 

[flemm]

Eh, I didn't think he had "zero personality". He wasn't the energetic, funny, or powerfully charismatic type - and I can understand why you'd expect Kira's love interest to be more colourful, but I thought that their relationship made perfect sense. Bareil was a spiritual, intelligent, quiet, gentle, dignified, respected Bajoran religious leader. Kira is very religious, and Bareil was the kind of man she could admire, and he could also understand her. (And it didn't hurt that he was also very handsome.)

I also thought the Kira/Bareil relationship worked. He was not over-bearing, aggressive or extroverted, but he certainly didn't lack charisma. The character was strong, gentle, spiritual and handsome. A very convincing match for Kira imo. I had no trouble understanding exactly why she would love this man, or why he would love her. He was a healer, she needed to be healed. Bareil himself was popular with the fans, and there was a lot of outcry when he was killed off, as I recall.

Shakaar didn't work nearly as well. He was also handsome, and conformed more to the norm of the "man of action" as romantic interest. However, the chemistry between the two actors wasn't there, and there was comparatively little reason for Kira to be interested in this man, other than the fact that he was attractive in a generic sort of way. Not surprisingly, the writers didn't feel they could do much with this, and basically left their relationship in the background until deciding to go ahead with the Kira/Odo romance.

Nana Visitor and Marc Alaimo did have excellent chemistry, and the writers exploited this to good effect in season four especially, I thought, and occasionally later on, though they were wise enough to realize that they could not take this relationship very far toward actual romance.

 

[DevilEyes]

Eh, I didn't think he had "zero personality". He wasn't the energetic, funny, or powerfully charismatic type - and I can understand why you'd expect Kira's love interest to be more colourful, but I thought that their relationship made perfect sense. Bareil was a spiritual, intelligent, quiet, gentle, dignified, respected Bajoran religious leader. Kira is very religious, and Bareil was the kind of man she could admire, and he could also understand her. (And it didn't hurt that he was also very handsome.)

I also thought the Kira/Bareil relationship worked. He was not over-bearing, aggressive or extroverted, but he certainly didn't lack charisma. The character was strong, gentle, spiritual and handsome. A very convincing match for Kira imo. I had no trouble understanding exactly why she would love this man, or why he would love her. He was a healer, she needed to be healed. Bareil himself was popular with the fans, and there was a lot of outcry when he was killed off, as I recall.

Shakaar didn't work nearly as well. He was also handsome, and conformed more to the norm of the "man of action" as romantic interest. However, the chemistry between the two actors wasn't there, and there was comparatively little reason for Kira to be interested in this man, other than the fact that he was attractive in a generic sort of way. Not surprisingly, the writers didn't feel they could do much with this, and basically left their relationship in the background until deciding to go ahead with the Kira/Odo romance.

Nana Visitor and Marc Alaimo did have excellent chemistry, and the writers exploited this to good effect in season four especially, I thought, and occasionally later on, though they were wise enough to realize that they could not take this relationship very far toward actual romance.

Well said. You expressed it all much better than I could. I liked Bareil and their relationship and was sad when he died.

Kira and Shakaar didn't have much chemistry, but I'm not even sure if the writers were ever seriously commited to the story about Kira and Shakaar other than as a way to emphasize Odo's feelings for Kira. It felt like a plot device, while the Kira/Bareil storyline was handled with much more care and seemed more genuine.